UNESCO launches “Futures of Education” at the United Nations General Assembly

UNESCO launched the Futures of Education, a global initiative to reimagine how knowledge and learning can contribute to the common good of humanity during a high-level event at the United Nations General Assembly in New York on 25 September. UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay said the project will provide “a global conversation as well as a report on the future of education, drawing on the diverse and fruitful ways of learning practiced around the world, resolutely forward-looking, yet grounded in human rights at the service of the dignity of all”.

The context
With accelerated climate change, the fragility of our planet is becoming more and more apparent. Persistent inequalities, social fragmentation, and political extremism are bringing many societies to a point of crisis. Advances in digital communication, artificial intelligence, and biotechnology have great potential but also raise serious ethical and governance concerns, especially as promises of innovation and technological change have an uneven record of contributing to human flourishing.

The vision
Knowledge and learning are humanity’s greatest renewable resources for responding to challenges and inventing alternatives. Yet, education does more than respond to a changing world. Education transforms the world.
Looking to 2050 and beyond, the initiative aims to catalyze a global debate on education and to reimagine how knowledge and learning can shape the future of humanity and the planet.

The aim
This initiative will mobilize a number of rich ways of being and knowing in order to leverage humanity’s collective intelligence. It relies on a broad, open consultative process that involves youth, educators, civil society, governments, business, and other stakeholders. This work will be guided by a high-level International Commission of thought-leaders from diverse fields and different regions of the world. In November 2021, the commission will publish a report designed to share a forward-looking vision of what education and learning might yet become and offer a policy agenda.